why do we require sleep?

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why do we require sleep?

This has been bothering me for a while. I have seemed to fall into a lapse of insomnia and I am finding it quite euphoric. I have slept seven hours in the past 120 hours...and put roughly 800 miles on my car at night driving around. I don't think I have any mental malfunctions but this is still bugging me. Why do we need to sleep? I know that horomones are generated during sleep and the body uses this unconscious state to repair and rebuild tissue structures. Physiologically why must we sleep? And how did homoerectus evlove to require sleep for 8 hours a day? I know that we would be much more productive in society if we didn't have to sleep. Just taking a break here from not sleeping to post. Sorry if there are errors or it seems choppy...................

"Owners of dogs will have noticed that, if you provide them with food and water and shelter and affection, they will think you are god. Whereas owners of cats are compelled to realize that, if you provide them with food and water and shelter and affection, they draw the conclusion that they are gods."
-Christopher Hitchens

There are some interesting things about sleep I heard once upon a time. I read in some scientific journal or something of that sort how some scientists did a sleep deprivation study on lab rats. They had them on a revolving floor type thing that would start to spin if the ratfell asleep. Even though the guy ate normally he was losing weight like a son of a gun. After a week or so, the little fellow just died. From what? Lack of sleep.

Another thing is how researchers found that the less sleep you get per night, the longer you live. That's not to say that if you don't sleep at all you'll live forever, but they compared people who slept for 8 hours a night to people who slept less than 6 (or so) and found those lazy 8 hour guys died younger.

Interesting stuff, ey? Now, for your question. Have you seen Fight Club, btw? We humans (and most all living creatures, for that matter) require sleep:

Who Sleeps?
Reptiles, birds and mammals all sleep. That is, they become unconscious to their surroundings for periods of time. Some fish and amphibians reduce their awareness but do not ever become unconscious like the higher vertebrates do. Insects do not appear to sleep, although they may become inactive in daylight or darkness.
By studying brainwaves, it is known that reptiles do not dream. Birds dream a little. Mammals all dream during sleep.

Different animals sleep in different ways. Some animals, like humans, prefer to sleep in one long session. Other animals (dogs, for example) like to sleep in many short bursts. Some sleep at night, while others sleep during the day.

When You Miss Some Zzzzs...
One way to understand why we sleep is to look at what happens when we don't get enough:
As you know if you have ever pulled an all-nighter, missing one night of sleep is not fatal. A person will generally be irritable during the next day and will either slow down (become tired easily) or will be totally wired because of adrenalin.

If a person misses two nights of sleep, it gets worse. Concentration is difficult, and attention span falls by the wayside. Mistakes increase.

After three days, a person will start to hallucinate and clear thinking is impossible. With continued wakefulness a person can lose grasp of reality. Rats forced to stay awake continuously will eventually die, proving that sleep is essential. A person who gets just a few hours of sleep per night can experience many of the same problems over time. Two other things are known to happen during sleep. Growth hormone in children is secreted during sleep, and chemicals important to the immune system are secreted during sleep. You can become more prone to disease if you don't get enough sleep, and a child's growth can be stunted by sleep deprivation.

But the question remains -- why do we need to sleep? Let's take a look at some of the possible reasons.

Why Sleep?
No one really knows why we sleep. But, there are all kinds of theories, including these:
Sleep gives the body a chance to repair muscles and other tissues, replace aging or dead cells, etc.

Sleep gives the brain a chance to organize and archive memories. Dreams are thought by some to be part of this process.

Sleep lowers our energy consumption, so we need three meals a day rather than four or five. Since we can't do anything in the dark anyway, we might as well "turn off" and save the energy.

According to ScienceNewsOnline: Napless cats awaken interest in adenosine, sleep may be a way of recharging the brain, using adenosine as a signal that the brain needs to rest: "Since adenosine secretion reflects brain cell activity, rising concentrations of this chemical may be how the organ gauges that it has been burning up its energy reserves and needs to shut down for a while." Adenosine levels in the brain rise during wakefulness and decline during sleep. What we all know is that, with a good night's sleep, everything looks and feels better in the morning. Both the brain and the body are refreshed and ready for a new day.

Ask your doctor for some Red-and-blue Tuinal, or perhaps lipstick-red Seconals. That outta help. If not, share with us your experiences.

I have noticed things slipping on and off gradually. Colors waver in hues and I feel like I'm coming down from some sort of high. I haven't been on any chems except for healthy (maybe not) does of caffeine. In fact, the shirt I'm wearing at this moment says "Caffienate". Anyhow...I have slept usually one-one1/2 hours intermitantly about every 36 hours. I feel not really depressed but a lucent elation of concentration that comes in bouts. I can read hundreds of pages of a book in one sitting and recall most of it. I notice ordinary things deeper than before. For example, I sat outside a cafe on campus this morning smoking a cigarette and noticed how many people were where, where each came from, in what sequence they came, who they were with, where each left my sight, what they were wearing, what they were carrying, hair color, facial features, etc. Maybe my senses are detecting my deprivation of sleep and are trying to beef up in some sort of primal way. Does anyone have any prior knowledge of some sleep deprivation/torture experiments? I don't plan to keep this up any longer than it seems to last but it'll be a full week on friday or saturday. My immediate short-term memory seems fine, ma ybe even a touch enhanced. Anyhow I've gotta get back to work in my little cube (ever seen office space?) except I work with satellites instead of TPS report....wheres my swingline stapler.....?

As long as he doesn't kill anyone. I mean if he eats it through the trunk of a tree that's one thing, but to run over a sidewalk full of 5-year-olds is a whole other story. I mean, seriously, where do you think you can bury a whole sidewalk full of kindergartners without getting caught? Besides, it would take all day to dig a hole that deep.